During my second week of research into constructed language, I worked on constructing and describing my own language. Hilariously enough, although I expected this phase of research to be the simplest, it was very difficult. I began by creating a list of goals for my language, including a hierarchical derivational morphology, extreme simplicity and comprehensibility, and root-words from Proto-Indo-European language. I almost immediately scrapped these goals, as they proved impossible to accomplish in the remaining forty hours.
From then on, I took a more “organic” approach to language construction, focusing on my language’s lexicon and structure before establishing any goals. I decided to derive my language from Latin roots, because Latin is a language with which I am already very familiar. Here is part of the current lexicon of nouns in my language: [Read more…]

In the first week of my research, I focused on existing constructed languages (Ithkuil, Blissymbolics, Idiom Neutral, Esperanto, Tolkien languages, etc.) and on the logic and rationale behind their creation. Here, I will summarize my findings, beginning with a general overview and categorization of constructed language, and then moving on to a discussion of the constructed language Ithkuil.

Most human language comes into existence through the natural forces of linguistic evolution, but a “constructed language” draws upon deliberate design. What are the common aspects of constructed languages? What goes into the design process?

My project was using Critical Discourse Analysis on two speeches: one from Donald Trump and one from Hillary Clinton, in order to uncover how power was established, subverted, and maintained through their language use.